Nowhere to Hide (Delos Series Book 1) Page 6

  “What’s awful,” he said, raising his dark brows. “Is taking a bullet while you’re in a stall.” Then, he turned his head, pinning her with a dark look. “And General Culver wants you tailed. That’s what a tail does…they’re your shadow.”

  Snorting, she muttered, “Well, we’ll see about that. I don’t want a strange man with me in a woman’s restroom, bullets or no bullets.” Lia could swear he was smiling, but damned if his face wasn’t absolutely expressionless. And whether she wanted to or not, she enjoyed looking at him. He’d stirred her lower body into a new awakening, just like that!

  She suddenly realized that she wasn’t focusing on the report she’d submitted in the boardroom. Should she feel guilty?

  No, she had to admit, she was more interested in Cav at the moment. What had this man suffered? He had far more scars than she did, but they weren’t on his face. Unconsciously, she touched her scar on her cheek.

  “Is that hurting you?”

  Startled, her hand dropped away. For a moment, she caught him not wearing his game face. Instead, she saw concern in his eyes. For her.

  “No, I’m fine,” she said with embarrassment, feeling her face heat up. She stared straight ahead, tensing, afraid of what he might say. She couldn’t link his compassionate nature with his being a man. Nearly every other man who’d seen that scar had shown disgust, or gave her a look that that spoke volumes about how it messed up her face.

  Truth be known, Lia had never given much thought to her looks, even though her mother, Susan, had always said she was beautiful. Didn’t every mother think her child was beautiful?

  Cav held out his arm toward her. “I’ve got you beat by a mile on that score,” he said, giving her an amused look.

  Lia stared at his hard, muscled arm, so close to hers. Her fingers itched to slide along his darkly bronzed flesh and feel that black hair sprinkled across his forearm. It was tempting. She curved her fingers into her palms, keeping them on her lap.

  “Yes, you do,” she whispered.

  Cav put his hand on the wheel once more. He’d recognized the fear in her gray eyes when he mentioned her scar, and she’d actually yanked her fingers away from it, as if she’d been burned. Now, he knew how sensitive she was about it, and he wanted to calm her down. He actually felt a need to hold this woman in his arms, a reaction he’d never had before on the job.

  In truth, his heart had been engaged from the moment he’d seen her standing so uncertainly in the doorway of the boardroom. She looked like a deer ready to run pursued by a nearby predator.

  Would he want to have great sex with her? Absolutely. But this other feeling of personally wanting to protect her was very uncommon in his experience. It actually reminded him of the feeling he often had around children. For him, children always needed to be protected. Hell, he knew that better than most.

  This wasn’t the first time he’d worked to protect a female, but it was always all business. He’d never wanted to ask them personal questions or get to know them on a one-to-one basis. On the other hand, with Lia, he wanted to bombard her with hundreds of questions.

  He was sorry he’d upset her about her scar. He could see it in her sudden stiffness, the way she sat up in the seat, her hands fisted in her lap when he’d asked her if that scar was hurting her. The woman had suffered enough trauma without him stirring up whatever had created that scar on her face.

  “Aren’t you going to ask me how I got all my scars?” He kept his voice light and teasing, adding a slight curve to his mouth. Instantly, Cav saw Lia relax. She leaned back in the seat, her fists uncurling.

  “Did you get them as an operator?”

  “Yes, I did. I joined the SEALs at eighteen and stayed until I was twenty-five. You get a lot of nicks and scratches doing that kind of boots-on-the-ground work.” He glanced at her profile through the rear view mirror. Those sweet lips of hers had softened, and he sensed she was heaving a huge sigh of relief. Obviously, if he talked about himself, she was comfortable with that.

  “I’ve heard about you guys, but I never met one while I was in the military,” she admitted.

  “What branch were you in?” Cav asked, and saw her tighten up a little. As an operator, he knew body language. It was the nonverbal language of a human being—and was used sixty percent, versus the forty percent verbal language. He’d been trained to observe even the most minute body changes and could read them with great accuracy. He had her file, read it and memorized it. Cav knew the answer to the question, but he needed to establish some connection and trust with Lia. Her military file had a large, redacted section, so he had no way of knowing what that was about. And it was important he knew why that part was hidden from the world.

  “I was in the Army. Motor pool.”

  “Officer or enlisted?” She went rigid again. Why? He wondered if she’d been in combat, maybe a PTSD survivor. The questions he had for her were on a long, long list.

  “Enlisted. I was a sergeant, an E-4.”

  Now, even her voice was going tense. Lia usually had a mellow voice, a soothing alto, and it relaxed him when she spoke.

  “I was an E-5 when I got out, Petty Officer, second class,” he offered.

  Her mouth relaxed, giving him another clue. Cav wasn’t the greatest communicator, but hell, in his business, being the quiet type was a decided asset. But with Lia, he was just the opposite. He could see that she didn’t want to talk about herself just yet. If he opened up about himself, she became at ease once more. What the hell was she hiding?

  “Did you like being a SEAL?” she wondered aloud, turning to him.

  “Yeah, as a kid I’d always wanted to be one. They were kind of my comic book heroes.”

  Not that his childhood was a fairy tale. It was an ongoing nightmare, but he definitely wasn’t going there.

  “I loved comic books,” she said in a new, delighted voice. “I devoured them as a child.”

  “Who was your favorite?” Cav leapt on that like a bee discovering a flower. Lia, he was learning, was not only mysterious—she was hiding from the world.

  “I love the X-Men. Especially Wolverine,” and she smiled a little. “He was so scarred and been so badly wounded by brutal men.”

  Another puzzle piece. Clearly, some man or men had hurt her. Was that what the scar on her face and throat were all about? Cav ached to ask the question, but it was way too soon. He desperately needed to establish a platform of trust with this skittish woman with the beautiful diamond gray eyes.

  “Do you have a soft heart toward wounded animals,” Cav kept his voice light, with a little teasing, hoping to draw her out a bit more.

  Lia turned, studying him for a long moment. “Are all operators like you?”

  “Like what?”

  “Always asking sensitive, insightful questions?”

  Shrugging, Cav gave her a lopsided grin. “I don’t know. Is that what I do?”

  “Yes. You’re very good at it.” Almost too good. She swore she could feel Cav probing her, and the caring that burned in his hazel eyes told her he was sincerely interested in her.

  But why? Was he coming on to her? It didn’t feel like it. She’d had enough relationships and God knew, had been hit on enough in the military, to know when a man wanted one thing from her.

  But Cav’s inspection of her, that gentle prying, didn’t feel at all like that. This was a watershed moment for her, because ninety-nine percent of the men who had hit on her weren’t coming from the direction Cav clearly was. She had so little experience with a man like him, she felt inept and vulnerable.

  “When I was in Afghanistan, because I spoke Pashto, one of the main languages for that country, I was often called in on interrogations at Bagram. From a lot of early experience, I learned you got more with honey than vinegar.”

  Cav was definitely honey, Lia decided. “I was at Bagram,” she blurted out, then snapped her mouth shut. Damn! Her attack had happened there. Her fists curled on her thighs and she stared straight ahead, trying to wi
ll Cav into not pursuing her statement.

  “Really?” Cav saw her face drain of color after she’d said it. The vibe coming off her right now was stark terror. Okay, then, step around it. He opened his hands on the wheel and said, “It was a big base. At its peak, there were twenty-two thousand people there.”

  Out of the corner of his eye, he saw her draw in a deep breath, close her eyes for a moment and then reopen them. He was headed the right direction now.

  “Let’s talk about Wolverine? You up for that?” he teased. Even more relief showed in her face after that last comment.

  “I loved Wolverine as a teen,” she admitted. “As badly scarred and hurt as he was, he never took it out on others. All he did was protect the innocent and save others’ lives.”

  Cav absorbed her words, her voice suddenly filled with emotion. And he felt his own body react powerfully as she revealed herself at that one moment. Her eyes had gone from dull to shining. Her pale cheeks had flooded with pink. She was animated and engaged with him, a heady experience.

  His question had drawn her out of that hole she’d dug for herself. What was she hiding from? Cav wanted to ask her, but instead asked, “Did you have pets when you were growing up?”

  She smiled softly. “I had a horse, Goldy. He was a palomino. My dog, Champ, was a beautiful German Shepherd. And my cat, which was black as night, was called Inky.”

  “Sounds like you had a lot of furry, four-footed friends,” Cav said, watching the incredible change in her face. If he’d thought Lia was attractive before, she was positively glowing now, her eyes, a radiant silver, and her pursed mouth, soft and so kissable. Her skin glowed, and she was alive again, her hands open, gesturing.

  “I loved them so much. We rescued Champ from the dog pound. Inky was starving and I found him in a back-alley, so weak he couldn’t move. Goldy was going to be sold to a dog food factory. They were going to kill him and grind him up. Ugh, it was awful,” and she placed her hands against her lips in memory of that time.

  “Sounds like they got a good home with you, though,” Cav said, wanting to accent the positive of her animal rescues. “How old were you when you got Goldy?”

  “I was eleven. My Dad is a farmer. He grows sugar beets in Oregon. I went with him one day because he wanted to buy some chicks from the feed and seed store. I saw Goldy and seven other poor horses being off-loaded at the dog food factory. I hated that place because I knew they killed horses there and I loved horses. Goldy escaped and ran out of the corral. I got my Dad involved and a couple of the other guys who worked there. They were able to keep Goldy in a blind alley. I watched my Dad, who is so good with animals walk up to him, talking to him a real quiet voice, and Goldy stood stock-still. Dad was able to put the halter and lead rope on him.”

  Cav heard the wistfulness in her tone, that faraway look in her eyes. “What happened next?”

  “I started to cry as my dad led Goldy out of the alley. I begged him to bring Goldy home, that I couldn’t stand to see him being killed for dog food.”

  “And your dad? What did he do?”

  “He couldn’t stand to see me cry,” Lia said wryly, shaking her head. “He told me to dry my tears, that he’d buy Goldy and we’d get him sent by trailer to our farm. I was the happiest kid in the world at that moment.”

  Grinning, Cav said, “I can see it now. Your Dad is like lots of us guys, we hate to see a woman or child cry. We feel helpless because we can’t fix it.”

  “Funny, Dad always said that, too.”

  “Was he in the military?”

  “No.”

  Cav wanted to ask her how she got into the Army, but restrained himself. “Not only do you rescue animals, you also rescue kids that need help. Is that why you joined Delos?”

  Instantly, her face became soft and maternal. This woman could not keep a game face if she tried! Cav was secretly thrilled, because if he couldn’t pry Lia open verbally, he had his nonverbal skills in place to get to her.

  What threw him was that she trusted him enough to answer his questions without wondering why he was asking them. Cav felt their connection strongly. There was no doubt about it.

  She was going to be more than just an assignment, as someone to be protected at all cost. As a contractor, he was not to allow any emotional ties between himself and a client. But damn it, this woman invited those feelings without even realizing she was doing it. Cav didn’t think for a moment that she was like this with everyone, but who knew?

  “I’m a sucker for kids and animals, that’s true.” She smiled and gave a slight shrug. “I mean they’re innocent. Vulnerable. They need to be protected by the adults and the community around them. That’s the way I was raised, and that’s who I am today.”

  Images of his own childhood brought up anger and regret in Cav, if she only knew about his sordid childhood. Hell, going through BUD/s, the six-month SEAL school for recruits was easy compared to surviving daily with his cocaine-addicted father. Cav never knew, from the time he woke up in the morning, if he would see nightfall.

  “That’s a good way to be raised,” he agreed, trying to keep the feelings out of his voice. “Do you have brothers? Sisters?”

  “No, I’m an only child.”

  “And your Dad is a beet farmer in Oregon. What does your mother do?”

  “She’s a CPA for a bank in Ontario, Oregon. She’s actually the head of the department.”

  “You have a set of brainy parents, then. You said you were in motor pool? Did your dad teach you about mechanics at a young age?”

  She smiled a little. “I think you’re inside my head, reading my mind, Mr. Jordan.”

  “Call me Cav.” He shot a glance toward her. “How would you like to be addressed?”

  “Call me Lia.”

  “So, Lia? Did you help your dad in the barn, fixing the tractor and that sort of thing?”

  “Yes. I’ve always been fascinated with machinery. I think I got my Dad’s gene for that stuff. At the Delo’s school, I took care of the electric, plumbing and air conditioning. If it broke, I tried to fix it first before calling in an expert. It saved our charity money, and I got to use my skills.”

  “What else did you do there?”

  “I wasn’t a teacher, although I love to teach. I didn’t have the certificates for it. I made the kids’ lunches and two snacks in our small kitchen. I was also the manager of the facilities, for lack of a better description.”

  “A jack of all trades and master of all of them, I bet.” Cav met her gaze and felt as if a hand had gripped his heart in that moment. Right now, at this minute, Lia looked so much younger, fresh and alive. And then he realized as the armada sped out of San José, on a four-lane freeway heading north toward the forest and jungle, that she had finally—finally—relaxed. Not only that, she was beginning to trust him. That meant a lot to him, because in Cav’s business trust was the last thing you ever gave another person.

  Every human was a potential threat, a potential killer. Cav trusted no one, but it was natural for him, having grown up in a family where he knew his father couldn’t be trusted not go after him or his helpless mother. At first, his mother had tried to protect Cav, but after his father gave her a broken nose, arm and jaw one year, her spirit was broken.

  So Cav’s legacy was to trust no one. Maybe that was why he never got into any serious relationship with a woman. He didn’t trust women, either.

  However, it was imperative that his PSD, in this case, Lia, trust him a hundred percent. Cav told himself this was what he was doing, but the truth was, he was eager for personal information about her. Why? Because she excited him in ways he’d never felt in his life. And while it was far more than about sex, that was in the mix, too.

  “Well, I don’t know about being an expert in everything mechanical,” Lia countered, shaking her head. “You know, we all have our strengths and weaknesses.”

  Cav liked her humility. He would bet she was amazing at fixing cars, trucks, tractors or anything else with
an engine in it. “Can you give me an idea of a day in your life at the charity? Before it was burnt to the ground?”

  She sighed, rubbing her face. “I get up at 0600. Get my coffee, take a shower and get over to the school at 0700. We start classes at 0900. We had five classrooms for the different grades that Maria and Sophia taught. Different groups of kids would come in at different times. I was responsible for knowing the teacher’s lesson plan, having the books and anything else needed in that classroom for the teacher and the children to use.” She gave him a wry look. “This is really boring stuff.”

  “Take my word for it, Lia, there’s nothing boring about you.” As soon as Cav spoke them, he wished he could retract them. But he couldn’t. Even his voice had changed, thickened with emotion. When he glanced at her, he saw Lia’s winged brows lift in surprise.

  Lia didn’t know how to take Cav’s comment, but there was something in his eyes and voice that sent excitement and hope through her.

  “Then,” she continued, “I would then take the time to clean up the place, clean the bathrooms and wash windows or clear cobwebs. At 1000, I had a snack prepared for all the children. At 1100, I made all the children’s lunches, and they’d eat in the dining room together. I’d wash all the dishes afterward and clean things up. At 1400, I had another little snack for the kids and then we’d put them down for a nap in our sleeping room for an hour. At 1500, the bus came by and all the kids got on it. They were delivered back to their homes in La Fortuna and the surrounding area.”

  “And you still weren’t done?”

  She offered him a smile. “No. We had a washer and dryer on the premises and I washed all the bedding the children slept on, along with the light blankets over them, towels, washcloths and dried them in our dryer. By the time 1700 rolled around, I was done for the day and went home.”

  “Tell me about your home?” Cav kept tabs on the armada as it sped along at sixty miles per hour. Up ahead, the gradient changed and he could see the low jungle mountains painted like pale green watercolor ghosts, rising out of the horizon in the distance. That was the beginning of what was known as the northern highlands of Costa Rica.